• A Malcolm Tucker omnishambles for Lib Dem spin paramedics in Glasgow: a detailed crib sheet of the line that MPs and others should take in media interviews was inadvertently emailed to journalists, complete with jewellery tax (we don't plan one) to cider making (it must move upmarket). The missive told them to say the conference is "in a confident mood" and has "a strong record of achievement in government" to be proud of. Labour? "It can't be trusted to build a strong economy." Those Tories? They "on their own can't build a fair society". Note that "on their own" hint. "We are looking at how the richest 10% of people, those earning over £50k, could make a further contribution," it says. Very candid, Malcolm.
• The ubiquitous Nick Clegg boasts that, as a Sheffield MP, he keeps "a keen eye" on hi-tech manufacturing in the city. Not according to the British Chamber of Commerce he doesn't. He lets the Germans and the US military grab them, the BCC's CEO, John Longworth, told a Hitachi-sponsored fringe meeting on infrastructure strategy. When a Sheffield start-up developed a way to turn surplus wind power into hydrogen fuel (cars can use it) British investors and the Treasury weren't interested. But the Germans ponied up (on condition that the firm set up in Germany). Don't get smug, Ed. Something similar happened with solar panels in Doncaster.
• Taunton's Lib Dem MP, Jeremy Browne, is in the news again. His party is not liberal enough on economic matters, the home office minister told a free market thinktank's fringe. Has Browne become a publicity junkie? Or is he just a shy but unlucky libertarian? On Sunday Jezza called for a national debate about the Muslim niqab (Lib Dem outrage). Just days earlier the Times splashed on his comparison between Romanians camping out on British streets and UK second-home owners in the Dordogne (Tory outrage). Browne feels aggrieved on that one: all he was saying was that both are exercising an EU citizen's right to free movement. So that's OK.
• How to stimulate the growth economy? Don't ask Stuart Patrick, chief executive of the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce. He failed to turn up for his fringe meeting because he hadn't got himself a pass and G4S's vigilant stewards wouldn't let him in. Conference security mania has finally engulfed the once-relaxed Lib Dems and G4S seems unaware that the biggest threat to Lib Dem delegates comes from each other.
Good Day: Nick Clegg: He gave nine media interviews and made a vital intervention to win the economic vote (all before lunch). Then spoke again after lunch.
Bad Day: Vince Cable: A brilliant Tory-bashing speech, but he overplayed his hand and his standing ovation was brief.
